Day 4, August 8th, 2009

Broke into groups. My group went collecting near the Research Station along a very shallow stream. We spent about 3 hours "beating" brush, catching what fell off with a "beat sheet", collecting any caterpillars that we could find, and placing them with some vegetation in ziplock bags to take back to the lab. That afternoon we spent a couple of hours looking for wooley bears. They like to feed on oak trees during the night. As the sun rises they climb down the tree and burrow into the leaf litter along the base of the tree. We did not find any. It has been very dry. We did however find a cluster of caterpillars in a tree. Yours truly climbed up to get them. The remainder of the day was spent walking along the face of a huge rock face searching the vegetation for signs of caterpillar. After dinner, a couple of the more adventurous walked 4 miles down from the Research Station to the ranch as the night fell.